Jim Smoak purchased his first banjo from Sears Roebuck at age 12 after winning a 4-H club prize in South Carolina. As soon as he graduated from high school, Jim hit the road with his banjo with the goal of ending up on the Grand Ole Opry. “Bill Monroe hired me in 1952 and that’s when I began playing on the Grand Ole Opry. I was with the folk group, The Cumberlands in the 1960’s with several guest spots on the Grand Ole Opry.” He traveled through the eastern and southwestern United States in the 50’s and 60’s with Bill Monroe, Little Jimmy Dickens, Hylo Brown, and The Cumberlands, and played at the first Newport Folk Festival in 1959 with Earl Scruggs.” He stopped touring in the 1970s when he met his wife and they moved to her hometown of Pekin, where he still lives and teaches banjo in nearby Louisville, Kentucky.

Becky Sprinkle and Marty Mundy are longtime friends who play old-time tunes together every week at Spring Mill State Park. Becky grew up on a farm near the Ohio River in Perry County where she learned to play guitar and sing country songs that she heard on the radio with her dad. Now retired from working for the Bedford public schools, she keeps involved in the local music scene and is well-known and admired in her community. A multi-instrumentalist, Marty has lived much of his life near his childhood home on the White River in Martin County bordering the Hoosier National Forest. He spends his time hiking the familiar forested trails and performing for family gatherings and contra dances, including the Bloomington contra dance. As a duo, Becky and Marty share in a wide-reaching repertoire of traditional fiddle tunes, Irish songs, and old country and gospel favorites. With every song they perform, Becky and Marty have a story to tell about life in Indiana.

Micah Bachrach plays modern funk/jazz pop, and wants to normalize the conversation of mental health through his lyrics of discussing his own relatable personal struggles.

Sara Bredemeyer is a born-and-raised Bloomingtonian songwriter, writing soft indie pop and indie folk. You can find her debut 2016 album Heavy Hearts on Spotify and other common music platforms.

Macrohard Onfire is a collaborative project from electronic musicians and Audio Engineering students Garrett Spoelhof and Joey Miller, who you may know if you’ve ever listened to Secret Mezzanine, Spüly G, or Tiger Skywave. Combining extensive knowledge of the music of Dance Dance Revolution and the brewing of pour over coffee, Macrohard Onfire makes jazz-influenced electronic music (or, on a good day, electronic-influenced jazz music) that is aimed at convincing the listener to boot up their old computer and open Microsoft Publisher 2003. You can find Macrohard Onfire’s music onSpotify andBandcamp.

Gesto Vuoto is an alternative rock band based in Bloomington, IN. Their hard-hitting sound quickly found itself in the local music scene, with shows at multiple venues across the state. Formed in 2019, the band consists of Victor Roa(vocals, guitar), Yuri Santos(bass, and Devon Rigali(drums).

DJ Davy is an IU Bloomington Campus DJ studying liberal studies with an AAADS minor with aspirations to make it big. Bringing big energy and big crowds, he hopes one day, in collaboration with local Gary rapper Almighty FO, to take his talents across the globe providing quality entertainment for all events. He primarily mixes Hip-Hop and R&B with a particular eye for smooth transitions and beat mixing. When listening to a DJ Davy set it should feel like a nonstop IU Dance Marathon. You can follow and support him on social media @itsdjdavy.

IU Contemporary Dance Presents Sounding Bodies in Progress

Catch a special preview of Contemporary Dance's winter dance program! Join us for Sounding Bodies, an evening of choreography and  performance uniting dance and protest. Faculty, students, and guest artists investigate movement, dissent, and resilience as a site for education, action and healing.

Directed by Liz Shea.

Sounding Bodies will be presented virtually December 15-19, 2020. Tickets are available now. 

Soma is a saxophone quartet formed at the Indiana University Jacobs School of Music under the guidance of Otis Murphy. The members of the quartet include David Bayard (soprano), Paul Lorenz (alto), Sean Bradley (tenor), and Arthur Liang (baritone). Soma was recently awarded the Grand Prize at the 9th Plowman Chamber Music Competition in 2019. Other awards include First Runner-Up in the Classics Alive Young Artist Competition in 2018, and First Prize in the 2017 Chicago Woodwind Ensemble Competition. They were also finalists in the 2020 and 2018 North American Saxophone Alliance Quartet Competitions.

Based out of Bloomington, Indiana, Soma has been active since the fall of 2016 and has performed a wide variety of concerts including recitals at the International Navy Band Symposium, The inaugural American Single Reed Summit and the North American Saxophone Alliance region five conference. Soma is committed to performing new works to expand the quartet repertoire and has collaborated with several composers from Indiana University. Additionally, Soma has a passion for traditional repertoire and transcriptions, and has performed numerous outreach concerts in venues ranging from retirement centers to coffee shops as well as the Bloomington Transit Center. These outreach concerts serve to further Soma's goal of bringing the saxophone to a broader audience. 

Students and Faculty of the Historical Performance Institute present music of 16th & 17th century Italy. Featuring Renaissance instruments like the sackbut, dulcian, violins, and more! 

The EGO performs fundamental guitar repertoire as well as orchestral and Pops works. From Vivaldi, Bach and Mozart to The Beatles, Queen and Prince, the group presents arrangements that aim to expose audiences to unique versions of well-known classics. Often, the orchestra premieres and introduces new works specifically written for this unique formation.

Members: Alex Goldblatt, Peter Pendowski, Ben Jackson, Matt Wherley, Anton Von Sehrwald, Jack Osborne, Thomas Dohner, Grace Elmer, Petar Jankovic, Robbie Darling, Daniel Duarte (Director)

Opus 2020 Chamber Orchestra is a collective of Jacobs school of Music students who craved to create live music together during the COVID-19 pandemic. With restrictions in place banning large musical gatherings at Jacobs and all across campus, we were eager to find a safe way to continue sharing and performing music.